Working for the past 50 years under the limits of a constitutional monarchy, the King has initiated, planned and monitored well over 4,000 projects in the agricultural, health, scientific, environmental and social fields. Because the projects and programmes are so numerous, I will list headings under which they can be grouped, and highlight some of them as examples.

The headings under which His Majesty's work can be grouped are as follows:

- Total eradication of opium and cannabis cultivation with provision of substitution crops accompanied by social and educational programmes.

- Experimental farming leading to new farming methods based on self-reliance.

- Water management, mostly on a micro level and hence community-based.

- Environmental conservation using nature or low technology.

- Rain-making.

- Reforestation.

- Healthcare for marginalised communities, including the eradication of leprosy.

- Infrastructures in very poor areas of the country.

- Mechanical aerators to help clean polluted water. Several models were invented by the King and patented in 1979.

Under the heading of opium and cannabis eradication was a multitude of projects run by the Royal Project Foundation, which was established in north Thailand in 1969. The total disappearance of opium cultivation, itself a feat and a model for United Nations agencies, led the British government to recruit an expert in crop substitution from the programme to go to Afghanistan after the regime change. Today, substituted crops in north Thailand include non-indigenous vegetables and fruits such as strawberry, apple, lichee and grapes, spurring winery and a range of agro industries previously thought to be impossible. Other programmes supported by the foundation include soil conservation, rain forest conservation, medicinal plant research and farming, new agro technologies, agro management and marketing, and educational and health programmes for the highland tribesmen.

In 1988, the King established the Chaipattana Foundation to handle projects, which could spread to other parts of the country besides the North. The main objective of the foundation was to help accelerate rural development and it soon resulted in the doubling or even trebling of income for agricultural workers while, at the same time, conserving the environment. It also helped the government to circumvent budgetary problems by using start-up funds from public donations. Reciprocation by the government resulted in the setting up of the Office of the Royal Development Projects Board (ORDPB) with government funding. Since the King's projects were invariably community-based, projects undertaken by ORDPB provided critical links between the marginalised population and government agencies. Project planning in this instance was no longer top-down but was instead formulated together with people at the grass-roots level.

Many community research projects were instituted under the Chaipattana Foundation. This research covered scientific and engineering aspects and resulted, for example, in an artificial rain-making process now adopted in neighbouring countries, and aerators which today are in use all over the country as well as abroad, including, recently, Belgium.

The King initiated a total of 3,724 projects under the Chaipattana Foundation from its inception through to 2005. In addition to programmes under the Royal Project Foundation, which numbered 626 in 2003, the number of projects initiated by His Majesty comes to 4,350. This does not include hundreds more initiatives under healthcare projects and research programmes affiliated with or outsourced to universities and other institutions.

Nowadays some people may dismiss the activities of monarchs as being noblesse oblige. But the 4,350-plus projects, and more, go well beyond the limits and bounds of normal royal obligation. Some may think that as King, he has the authority to make things happen. Yet with whatever prerogatives he may have, the King's actions have to be constitutional and in line with government policy. In this respect the King's authority is purely moral.

The King works with a relatively low profile. We catch glimpses of him travelling the countryside on television, but little do we know that these are just the tip of an iceberg of work undertaken with consistency and on a superhuman scale. And little do we realise that our monarch has been spending more than half the year away from the affluence of Bangkok to institute programmes in rural communities, that is until in recent years when his doctors curbed his activities due to the state of his health.

Sumet Jumsai is a Professorial Fellow at the University of Melbourne.

Sumet Jumsai